King Kong by Will Murray

Author:Will Murray [Murray, Will]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 37

ALL NIGHT long, little Nkima and Ignatz the ship monkey had scampered and raced along the interlacing forest canopy. They paused often, peering about for signs of danger, picking nits off one another, panting from exertion.

Where the trees thinned out, the two monkeys dropped down into the tall savanna grass and scampered along, trying to make as little noise as possible amid the waving blades of emerald.

They came at last to a broad river where hippopotamus and crocodile coexisted in peace.

This truce was not a product of good fellowship, but the natural consequence of two formidable species being forced to share the winding waterway. The crocodiles might enjoy the taste of hippopotamus meat, but they valued their lives much more, so they did not trouble the great wallowing creatures.

Inasmuch as hippopotami fed on bottom grasses and other vegetarian fare, the horny-ridged crocodiles tempted the hippopotamus herd not.

Thus was order maintained in the jungle of the Colony of Kenya in British East Africa.

Creeping through the waving grass, Nkima led the way to the riverbank where he dipped his hand in and drank as monkeys do, a cupped palm of water at a time.

Ignatz followed suit. The frightened little monkey drank greedily, often staring about him. He was used to the comparative safety of a stout tramp steamer, where there were no natural predators. Possibly he had lived in a forest when very young, before Lumpy the cook acquired him. But that was long ago in monkey time.

So Ignatz stayed close to his new friend who, while not himself a brave creature, knew his way through the jungle.

After they had filled their tiny bellies with cool drinking water, Nkima gestured for Ignatz to follow. The nervous ship monkey naturally obeyed, but when he saw what Nkima did next, a deep fear gripped him.

A crocodile was slipping off the muddy river bank to cross the waters with paddling claws.

Displaying no fear, Nkima ran for its heavy tail, leapt up on it, and so gained the middle of the saurian’s bumpy back. Turning, he signaled Ignatz to follow quickly.

Ignatz hesitated, a deep terror welling in his dark eyes.

Venting a sharp screech, Nkima urged the frightened monk to hurry up.

Fear is a strange thing. It comes in shades and degrees and weights and other metaphysical measurements. Ignatz was afraid to follow—but he was even more fearful of being left behind, he finally decided. Venting a screech of his own, he raced on all fours, and leapt from the mud to the back of the crocodile just after the sinuous thing splashed into the water.

There, on that nodular surface, the two monkeys squatted, tails curled at their backs like mirror images, while the oblivious crocodile patiently crossed the river, and reached the opposite bank, employing its foreclaws to pull itself up onto the muddy embankment.

There, Nkima gave Ignatz a hard spank to propel him away.

The two comrades made a mad dash for the nearest tree, climbed it easily, and immediately started looking around for a more substantial tree within jumping distance.

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